Association Development and Marketing Manager

Organization:
Land O'Lakes International Development

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JOB DESCRIPTION

Land O’Lakes International Development is a 501(c)(3) nonprofit helping communities around the world build economies by strengthening agriculture from farm-to-fork, helping businesses grow, and linking farmers to markets. Since our start in 1981, we have been leveraging nearly 100 years of expertise in dairy, animal nutrition, crop inputs and agricultural insights from our close affiliate, Land O’Lakes, Inc., a farmer-owned agribusiness committed to fulfilling its purpose of feeding human progress.

Our team is made up of nearly 350 employees who are committed to market-led approaches, and passionate about collaborating locally to create lasting inclusive economic growth. By unlocking the potential of agriculture for the last 36 years, the lives of more than 3 million people have been transformed through nearly 300 programs in more than 80 countries.

Project Description

Land O’ Lakes International Development (Land O’Lakes-ID) is implementing a 5-year project funded by the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) with an objective to:

Increase agricultural productivity in the dairy and beef sectors by disseminating farm management best practices and expanding private sector input and extension models through catalytic capital and business development support; and

Expand trade of agricultural products in the dairy and beef sectors by improving food safety and quality, product innovation and marketing across both public and private sector market participants.

SQIL will implement the following activities: (1) Expand Market Access through supporting the development of dairy and beef industries led Seal of Quality (SOQ) standards and certification, representing Georgian measures of excellence and international manufacturing best practices; (2) Improve Phytosanitary Standards through building the capacity of Georgian firms to provide food safety technical assistance to dairy and beef business operators through leveraging of the successful training model promoted by Michigan State University (MSU). The project will also work with government institutions to disseminate public extension content and food safety information and provide support to the National Food Agency to build the operational infrastructure and human resource capacity within the agency. (3) Improve Post-Harvest Handling and Storage analyzing the cold storage, transportation and logistics system across the targeted regions and identify areas for management and infrastructural improvements and subsequently provide training to build the capacity of local business development services and link cold chain and logistics operators to local business development service firms to develop and refine their business plans. Land O’Lakes-ID will forge linkages between selected firms and commercial banks offering loan products to facilitate lending for infrastructural improvements. (4) Improve Productivity through developing a livestock animal husbandry curriculum and embedding it in a communications technology platform. The curriculum will draw on globally accepted best practices for dairy and beef production and will align with industry quality and animal welfare standards. (5) Improve Access to Financial Services through establishing a co-investment innovation fund focused on increasing product, service and business model innovation –including embedded extension services. (6) Capacity Building to Inform Food Safety Policy Development through mobilizing policy experts to assess the Government of Georgia’s (GoG) food safety policy strategies and approximation plans and provide technical assistance to GoG ministries on policy formulation that enables Georgia to meet international standards.

Position Summary and Primary Responsibilities:

This position will work with farmers, dairy and beef industry associations in Georgia to develop their institutional capacity for governance and management, provision of membership services, industries representation and interface with GoG, inter-association collaboration towards improvement of food safety and quality and marketing of Georgian dairy and beef with an objective to increase competitiveness of and trade with Georgian dairy and beef products as well as production inputs and achieve financial sustainability of both associations and their marketing support activities. This position is also responsible for planning, directing, and coordinating all marketing activities of the program linked to the Seal of Quality activities through supporting the industry associations and their members building marketing strategies and linkages with input suppliers, wholesalers, retailers and domestic consumers. S/he will assist with the development and implementation of various marketing strategies aimed at increasing the demand for Georgian dairy and beef products.

Assist associations and SoQ Consortium of Associations develop business plans and strategic marketing plans with defined targets for trade and competitiveness growth and development.

Support the individual associations and the SoQ Consortium prioritize solutions to overcoming identified market constraints with emphasis on those solutions that improve milk and beef quality, improved productivity and increased milk/beef consumption, reducing production costs and increasing farm and enterprise profitability while removing gender-based constraints and promoting environmentally sustainable practices.

Represent Program in a positive manner to technical assistance recipients and beneficiaries, GoG stakeholders and other interested parties, through periodic field visits to project clients.

Utilize established Sharepoint system (DevLink) to store key documents and share key project and country related information with other staff.

Participate in designing SQIL work plans for marketing assistance to focused program beneficiaries and implementation of national advertising and awareness building campaigns.

Liaise with Program Technical Staff and partners on the creation of market systems analysis for the dairy and beef sectors.

Assist processors, producer groups, and input/service providers to identify and develop market and trade linkages and improve the penetration and efficiency of their distribution systems.

Coordinate market surveys when appropriate to collect information for program design/activities and/or assessment of impact for the program.

Ensure effective monitoring and evaluation of all association development, marketing and promotional activities in coordination with the organization’s M&E Team.

All other duties arising from the SQIL Work Plans as assigned by Technical director and CoP.

Reporting & Supervision:

The position will report to the Technical Director

Required Skills and Qualifications:

Master’s degree in in Business Management/Marketing or bachelor’s degree with at least five years’ experience in agricultural, preferably dairy and beef value chains products marketing, sales and distribution.

Good knowledge of the dairy and beef market system in Georgia and the region.

Previous experience working with agricultural, preferably dairy and beef associations in Georgia.

Ability to analyze market channels to identify underserved opportunities and support formulation of marketing strategies to capture sales opportunities

Ability to evaluate distribution systems to identify inefficiencies and support development of strategies to streamline distribution and cut costs.

Proven ability to strengthen relationships between producers and wholesale/retail outlets.

Willing to travel to and spend large periods of time in rural setting.

Demonstrated ability to effectively present information and respond to questions in public groups.

Excellent verbal and written communication skills in Georgian and English with the ability to dialogue and network with enterprises, industry associations, national GoG public agencies and various industry stakeholders and development partners focusing on the development of the dairy and beef sectors.

We are an Equal Opportunity and Affirmative Action Employer. If you are interested and believe that you have the skills and experience required in the position description, please send a cover letter and current CV with 3 references’ e-mail and phone number. Applications and CVs will be accepted in English language only.

Incomplete applications will not be reviewed. No phone calls please, only finalists will be contacted.